Question: What is $54\%$ of $800$ ?
Solution: Having $54\%$ of something means that you get $54$ out of every $100$ We can set up a proportion to find out what number is $54\%$ of $800$ $ \dfrac{{\text{percent}}}{100} = \dfrac{{\text{part}}}{{\text{whole}}}$ Which things do we know, and what are we trying to find? We know the ${\text{percent}}$ is $54$ . Is $800$ the ${\text{part}}$ or the ${\text{whole}}$ The $800$ is the ${\text{whole}}$ . We are trying to find the ${\text{part}}$ that makes up $54\%$ of it: $ \dfrac{{54}}{100} = \dfrac{{\text{part}}}{{800}}$ If we multiply the denominator of the fraction on the left by $8$ , it will be the same denominator of the fraction on the right. To keep things equal, let's also multiply the numerator on the left by $8$ $ \dfrac{{54} \times 8}{100 \times 8} = \dfrac{{\text{part}}}{{800}}$ $ \dfrac{{432}}{800} = \dfrac{{\text{part}}}{{800}}$ $ {432} = {\text{part}}$ So $432$ is $54\%$ of $800$.